Here We Go with the French Revolution Metaphors

The Tea Party as “Jacobin” Republicans? Ted Cruz as Robespierre?

Yeah, huh?

This was in The American Conservative on Friday, but I couldn’t get it posted until today. Rod Dreher links an interview with Richard Viguerie in this Newsmax interview, and then waxes historical for us.

Oh, it’s on:

Movement-conservative icon, author, and direct-market pioneer Richard Viguerie threw down the gauntlet to establishment Republicans and the GOP leadership Tuesday, charging that conservatives “have been betrayed, abandoned by our leaders, and that includes Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Kevin McCarthy, [and] Reince Priebus at the Republican National Committee.” …

“It’s a civil war in the GOP,” Viguerie declared Saturday in The New York Times. …

“We need to primary every single one of these big-government Republicans,” he said, “including Lamar Alexander, Mitch McConnell, [and] Thad Cochran down in Mississippi is being challenged. …

It’s here where Mr. Dreher lunges for the Pulitzer:

RINO hunt! This is astonishing, and can only be driven by an ideological mindset so impervious to reality that it would rather destroy political conservatism’s chances of actually running the country than succumb to the least impurity in the ranks….

The thing about this dynamic is that the purer the activists make the GOP, the weaker the party becomes, and thus the less likely to achieve policy goals. Which just drives the forces of purgation harder. Ted Cruz rules the Jacobin Republicans now, but he should remember what happened to Robespierre.

Well, other than the fact that the tea party is not a radical left-wing mob intimidating its detractors with a reign of terror, and Ted Cruz is not a demagogic rabble-rouser calling for the execution of a president, I completely agree. I personally don’t trust any movement that cleans up its own trash at rallies, either. What is an enemy of the people if you can’t call him scungy?

I mean, dude, have you even glanced at Lamar Alexander’s voting record? Lindsey Graham’s support for liberal judges and green energy? John McCain’s record on immigration? (McCain, sadly, is not up for reelection).

For a hundred years, with a couple of notable exceptions, the GOP has been controlled by Teddy Roosevelt progressives, Liberals, Rockefeller Republicans and what we now feel comfortable calling establishment Republicans.

Or RINOs.

Over that period they have given us—either by intention, acquiescence or political blunder: Social Security and Medicare; the departments of Education, Labor and Energy and the EPA; post-JFK gun control; the minimum wage; China as a superpower; and they will shortly help Democrats lock in citizenship for illegals and gay marriage.

And let us not forget big-government Republicans’ outrageous spending cost us the Congress in 2006, and gave us Barack Obama in 2008.

So, while it is true that the tea party’s present gripe is with ObamaCare, it is not at all difficult to think of a few reasons other than establishment Republicans’ betrayal on ObamaCare to boot their asses out of town.

One must wonder whether Rod Dreher is being completely candid with his views. Or is he simply plagiarizing DNC talking points to slap a big scarlet “A” on anybody’s chest that disagrees with big-government liberals.